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My poor iPad has survived flour, oil, lemon juice, and countless other kitchen mishaps. Maybe it's time I look a little more seriously at a dedicated kitchen computer. My options have just expanded with the arrival of the Archos ChefPad, an Android tablet built to handle the rigors of the cooking life.

The ChefPad is a full-blown 10-inch Android tablet running Jelly Bean with a 1.6GHz processor and 1GB of RAM behind it. There are the usual front and back cameras, in case you want to launch your own online cooking show. What makes it kitchen-specific are the preloaded cooking apps and easy-to-clean case.… Read more

America has a fat problem, and it's not just the humans. Many pets are also toting some extra poundage.

You could, of course, take your dog for more walks, or spend more time playing attack-the-fuzzy-thing with your cat. Or you could invest in a pet treadmill. Better yet, check out PetTread, a pet-treadmill design that looks like a giant hamster wheel.

PetTread is looking to raise $110,000 on Kickstarter to take a prototype version into production. Like many inventions, the PetTread came about as a result of personal experience. Creator John Gosson had an overweight cat named Noonie. Adjusting her diet didn't help much, so he used his electrical engineering background to craft a power treadmill she could safely use.… Read more

What if you could easily add custom-designed circuits to DIY projects like 3D-printed stuff? Here's a small mill that can churn them out with precision and power.

Othermill is a Kickstarter project that has quickly exceeded its fundraising goal. It's designed to be a portable, desktop three-axis mill that can produce printed circuit boards, jewelry, molds, and other objects.

Conceived by the wizards at San Francisco-based R&D shop Otherfab/Otherlab, known for its crazy inflatable robots, Othermill works with CAD software to cut material in three dimensions. Unlike 3D printing, it cuts material away instead of adding it. … Read more

Sooner or later, every object in existence, including you and me, will be re-created out of Legos.

Fans of the bricks have limitless passion. But beyond creating cool dioramas, Lego modelers truly impress when they make functional tools.

Case in point: the Hippmikser 2000 by Flickr user Hippotam, whose real name is Marcin Danielak.… Read more

It wasn't very long ago that for a developer to make a successful weather app, it had to have the most information possible. This meant developers would compete to pack tons of graphs, maps, diagrams, written forecasts -- and even forums where people could talk about weather -- into busy, confusing apps that tried to cover it all. But what you ended up with were long, listlike menus when the only information you probably wanted was what the weather might be like for the weekend.

Don't get me wrong, the feature-packed weather apps have their place, particularly when … Read more

There's a tablet for just about everyone. There are tablets for kids, tablets for early adopters, and tablets for the masses. Now, there's a tablet specifically designed for seniors who are skeptical about technology.

The Claris Companion may be the most welcoming-looking tablet ever created. It has rounded edges, a thick bamboo bezel, and a happy little stand that props it up. Speakers are built into the front so there's no mystery about where the sound is coming from. There's none of that shiny, futuristic aluminum and plastic look that's so popular. This tablet will settle right in with more traditional home decor.… Read more

Didn't get enough of Star Wars Day on the weekend? How about dazzling Sith Lords with this lightsaber-style flashlight?

The Phosforce from Wicked Lasers turns the company's powerful Arctic laser into a portable light that kicks out 500 lumens. It's nowhere near as powerful as the company's Torch flashlight -- which at 4,100 lumens is apparently strong enough to ignite paper -- but it's mighty bright. … Read more

We all know that white light is created when different color wavelengths combine. So what happens when you use that phenomenon to create a lightbulb?

That's exactly what Dutch designer Dennis Parren did when he developed his CMYK bulb. Well, sort of. Expanded from his original CMYK Lamp 2011 graduation project for Design Academy Eindhoven, the bulb consists of a white LED light source pointing downward. Then placed equidistantly around the bulb, the cyan, magenta and yellow LEDs face up.

This has the rather fun and fascinating effect of casting a triple shadow from whatever comes in front of the LEDs -- one in each of the three colors. … Read more

Kitchen showrooms are full of massive, shiny appliances meant to be strewn liberally about in a large kitchen. Most of the world, though, doesn't have that kind of space to spare for ovens, microwaves, refrigerators, kitchen islands, stovetops, and the like. The Clei Ecooking kitchen minds its manners and limits itself to a very compact space.

The Ecooking station is sleek, modern, and modular. It was created by Italian designer Massimo Facchinetti for Clei, a company specializing in transformable furniture. The company's creations are intended to make the most of small spaces like apartments and lofts.… Read more